By Four philanthropists have won this year’s prestigious $100,000 Madonna International Charity Peace Award. The presentation was held at Elele, in Rivers State. The recipients, who are nationals of the Republic of Togo, Cameroon, and the Kingdom of Cambodia are Mr Christopher Ezeaguka, Mr Njoku Alloysius Bibum and wife, Margaret, Madame Ngo Djob Catharine and Lenaghoin Hoy, a Buddhist from Cambodia in Asia. The award was instituted by Rev. Fr. Emmanuel M.P. Edeh in 2006 to address peace in the society. Through this award, Edeh reaches out to the society. Ezeaguka, a resident of Lome (Togo), bagged the 2011 Charity Peace Award for his grassroots charity that has given hope to many children. Ezeaguka has been paying the fees of indigent nursery and primary school pupils. This gesture triggered many parents and guardians whose children and wards are of school age to send them to him. The number of children to cater for has increased, hence the award, to enable him to cope with this project. The second recipient is Mr Bibum of Southern Cameroon and his wife Mrs. Magaret Anne Bibum, a Briton origin. The couple founded Buea School for deaf and dumb in South west Region of Cameroon. They met each other at the school for the deaf and dumb in England and later got married. As a gratitude to God for the opportunity to study in United Kingdom, Mr and Mrs Bibum Aloysius opened a special centre for the deaf and dumb in Cameroon. Initially, they were using their home because the number was small, but as the number kept increasing and there arose the need for a bigger accommodation, the population increased following the acquisition of a bigger accommodation. Consequently, the family decided to widen their horizon by buying a piece of land where they finally built a school for the deaf and dumb with full residential and educational facilities. Above all, beneficiaries are on scholarship. The third recipient was Madame Catharine, the founder of St Amille Marie Handicapped Centre in Cameroon. Although she is a trained community development officer, her inspiration about starting a home for the destitute and the handicapped children was aroused around 2004 when her daughter had a cardiac problem which led her to a successful surgery in Milan, Italy with the spiritual and financial assistance of a charitable group, With that experience driven by this wonderful gesture and love for mankind, she thought she could contribute to the improvement on the conditions in which some of these children live, especially the disabled who most of the time can hardly make both ends meet. The centre was founded on the April 13, 2004 immediately after the successful surgery of her daughter with the aim that the handicapped children improve on their living conditions and, moreover, to create sustainable development opportunities for the under privileged and disadvantaged handicapped youth and also to promote self-reliance. The centre is named after her daughter. This is why Madonna Institute finds her worthy of 2011 charity peace award.
The fourth recipient, Hoy (a Buddhist) from Cambodia (Asia) hit the Charity Peace Award 2011 for his effort to bring together, cater for, and restore the hope to live to many dispersed, motherless children and orphans abandoned to fate by the natural calamity (tsunami) that engulfed the Cambodian Kingdom over these months, wiping away thousands of families, and leaving many children helplessly floating on the ocean for days. This great effort which started like a temporary relief to the victims, quickly transformed into a mustard-tree project, that has not only effected positively on the immediate condition of the victims but has more so given rise to charity that has put many of them on the way to holistic self actualisation. In giving the prestigious Madonna International Charity Peace Award to Mr Hoy, a proved that to attain peace is very possible in our modern world if charity is enthroned through practical and effective doing of charity and promotion of its doers.
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